Shimmering Emeralds

2. Levi

2

Levi

When I opened my eyes, I blinked several times trying to alleviate the grogginess. My mind was fuzzy as I tried to piece together where I was and what had happened. Almost of its own accord, my hand reached up to my forehead. The thick, warm glob of blood there made me simultaneously wince and gag. Knowing I needed to pull myself together, I forced myself to focus through the dizziness.

It had all happened so fast, it was blurred together into one confusing, horrific moment in my mind. Suddenly, I realized that the school bus I’d been driving had crashed. A frigid surge of sheer terror that one of the children in my care might be injured engulfed my senses.

My memory fully returned in a nauseating flood. The man in the road had startled me so much that I had yanked the steering wheel to avoid hitting him. I had broken the number one rule of being a school bus driver. I knew not to endanger the kids by swerving to avoid hitting anything, yet in that fraction of a second, I’d seen a fellow human being in our path. When his terrified eyes locked with mine, my instinct had taken over, and I’d done my best not to hit him.

Despite the quick jerk of my hands on the wheel, I’d thought I would be able to recover and not hit the man or hurt any children. We must have been on some black ice on the road because when I turned the huge steering wheel, the ancient yellow school bus began sliding out of control.

Almost like when a person falls, but doesn’t realize what happened until they are on the ground, we careened around and toppled over the edge of the ravine in a fraction of an instant.

The bus was quiet… too quiet. It took me a moment to get my bearings because we were nearly upside down and tilted at a strange angle. I turned my head around, trying to glimpse the back of the bus, but couldn’t figure out why it was so still.

Bile rose up in my throat and threatened to upheave as I silently prayed that no one was injured. I would never forgive myself if anyone––especially a child––had been seriously hurt.

Holding on to the seat with one arm, hoping to keep myself from falling too hard to the top of the bus, I used my other hand to push the button to release my seat belt.

After a controlled fall toward the ceiling, I reached up to try to find the radio. I needed to get these kids off the bus, but first, we needed help to be on the way to us. One look out the shattered window, told me that we most likely were not at the bottom of this hill. The last thing we needed was for the bus to fall any farther before we could evacuate it.

Somehow, my voice managed to sound only slightly shaky as I relayed our location and precarious situation to dispatch.

Their response was fuzzy, and I was forced to assume they got the message down correctly because the bus suddenly went wild as a wave of panic swept through the rows of kids. My hopes of hearing what dispatch had to say were eliminated by the frightened screams of children. Although I was glad to hear that they were conscious, their piercing shrieks made it difficult to focus.

Knowing that I needed to get a handle on this before they began scrambling to get out of the bus and toppled us further down the hill, I raised my fingers to my lips and let out a high-pitched whistle. The sound was startling enough to catch everyone’s attention.

I knew the moment of silence would be brief, if I didn’t calm everyone down, so I spoke in a clear, loud voice, despite my growing sense of panic.

“Everyone please be quiet. We will get you off of this bus, but we need everyone’s cooperation.”

A quick look at the front doors of the bus told me that exit route was blocked by a large tree branch. Deciding to try our luck with the other exits, I made my way through the nearly upside-down aisle toward the back of the bus. The roof hatch was of no use because it was practically sitting on the ground. It could only be opened a few inches.

The back door and window emergency exits would be our only means of egress. One of the emergency windows was broken with dangerous shards of glass dangling precariously. A girl was working to release the latch of the window on the other side.

“If you’ve got this exit covered, I’ll go get the back door open,” I said to her.

“Yes, I’ll get it,” she promised before turning to glance in my direction.

In that brief moment, it felt like the ceiling fell out from under my feet as recognition bolted through my system. I would know those gorgeous green eyes anywhere… Meg Stark. The one that got away.

She still wasn’t any bigger than a minute. In fact, I had believed her to be one of the kids. Proving that she was still as fiery as ever, she aimed those green lasers in my direction and spat, “I said I’ve got this. Take care of the back.”

I didn’t have to be told twice. My mind would have to process later the shock of seeing Meg for the first time in over five years. Right now, we had an emergency to deal with––a terrible emergency that I had caused. It was yet another thing that Meg could hate me for.

As I made my way to the back of the bus, a frightened little girl grasping her knees as tears silently streamed down her cheeks caught my eye. “It’s going to be okay,” I promised her, hoping that I was right and silently cursing myself for being the cause of all of this trauma.

She lunged into my arms, and I didn’t have the heart to set her aside. Instead, I carried her toward the back of the bus. When we got there, I held her with one hand and used the other to unlatch the emergency exit door.

After flinging the door open, I said to the girl, “Step down to the ground, then climb up there.” I used my finger to point to a meeting place a safe distance away. “As kids come out of the bus, tell them to come up and stay with you, okay? Can you be in charge of that?”

She nodded solemnly, obviously taking her responsibility very seriously. Once she took the big step down from the top of the bus to the forest floor, she darted off in the direction I had indicated.

The children’s teacher, Mrs. Wright, touched my shoulder. The older woman looked frightened, but rational. “What do you need me to do?”

“Go out there and keep track of the kids at the meeting point.”

After helping her down the big step, I added, “There’s a man out in the woods somewhere. I’m not sure if we hit him.”

Mrs. Wright nodded her understanding before making the trek to the prescribed meeting spot.

I quickly began ushering more children out the door and instructing them to leave their belongings behind and follow their teacher. The frightened kids scurried out the door and ran to safety. I kept a count of them, but realized that I’d been so startled by Meg’s appearance that I hadn’t asked her to do the same. We would need to do a proper head count once we had everyone safely off the bus.

Of all of the mornings for me to have had a sick cow to deal with at my parents’ farm, which nearly made me late for the field trip, this had to be the worst. Normally, I liked to greet everyone as they boarded the bus and do a mental inventory of who was riding with me, as well as a full inspection of the bus.

This morning, I had skidded in just as it was time for us to leave. Principal Johnson had handed me the roster of passengers on a clipboard. I hadn’t even glanced at it or walked around the bus to do a minimal kick of the tires before boarding and taking off on our trip. Any other time, I would have known Meg was on my bus.

Forcing myself to focus on what was important in this moment, I watched as kid after kid jumped down to safety. There were some bumps, scrapes, and quickly forming bruises, but thankfully, I hadn’t seen any major injuries.

Proving that my sixth sense around her hadn’t completely evaporated, the tiny hairs on my arms stood at attention. Sure enough, when I turned around, Meg was standing directly behind me.

“We are down to one little boy who needs help to get down because of an injured leg,” she informed me.

“Okay,” I nodded, already walking toward the front of the bus, sweeping my head back and forth to check for anyone we might have missed.

Meg mumbled, “Oh, of course, he doesn’t believe me.”

I decided to ignore it, rather than point out that it was better to be safe than sorry. Besides, I was certain she’d have plenty to say later about my inability to keep my charges safe.

Once I made it to the front and was satisfied that Meg was right and only the three of us were left on the bus, I turned back to help the injured child.

Despite her diminutive size, Meg was already hefting the boy up as if she intended to carry him herself.

I took long strides to close the distance between us as I said to the stubborn woman, “I’ll carry him.”

“I’ve got hi––” her words trailed off and her eyes went wide with alarm as the bus groaned, shifted, and began to roll further down the hill.

I lunged to wrap my arms around Meg and the boy, squeezed my eyes shut, and hoped with all my might that the two of them wouldn’t be hurt as our bodies slammed into the side of the bus.